The invention relates to railroad cars, especially the trucks or bogies which are located at opposing ends of a railroad car to support the car on the rails of a trackway. More particularly, the invention relates to a truck which is manufactured and sold by National Castings Incorporated of Lisle, Ill. under the trademark SWING MOTION. A detailed description of this quality truck with excellent high speed performance characteristics is found in U.S. Pat. No. 3,670,660. The SWING MOTION truck is manufactured from many different steel parts, such as a bolster and transom which are coupled between a pair of sideframes between which a pair of axles with attached wheels are mounted in parallel relation for rotation about the longitudinal axes of the axles as the wheels roll along the rails of the trackway. Adjacent each of the opposing ends of the bolster are a pair of wedge pockets with oppositely sloped surfaces which are designed to engage a pair of spring loaded wedges which interact between the sideframe and bolster end to dampen undesirable motion of the sideframes and prevent it from being transmitted to the bolster and attached railroad car, such motion being caused, for example, by wavy or misaligned rails of the trackway. The invention is directed to the improvement of this motion dampening mechanism.
Briefly stated, the invention is in strengthening and improving the durability of the wedge contacting surfaces of the bolster, as will hereinafter be explained in greater detail.